Sigma(R) Life Science and the Culture Collections of Public Health England Collaborate to Distribute Cells and Cellular Extracts

ST. LOUIS, April 9, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Sigma-Aldrich Corporation (NASDAQ: SIAL) announced today that Sigma Life Science, its innovative biological products and services business, has signed an agreement with the Culture Collections of Public Health England, curators for the European Collection of Cell Cultures (ECACC®). In the agreement, the ECACC collection of unique, expertly preserved, authenticated human and animal cell cultures will be offered through the powerful Sigma-Aldrich website www.sigma.com/ecacc.

"ECACC cell lines are authenticated using Short Tandem Repeat (STR) profiling and other proprietary techniques. They are proven to be free of mycoplasma and other contaminants, providing researchers with a wide variety of readily available, high quality products," Julie Russell, Head of the Culture Collections of Public Health England, the new United Kingdom organization that subsumed the activities of the UK's Health Protection Agency on 1 April 2013, said. "This agreement will enable scientists around the globe to more easily access the ECACC cell lines."

Sigma Life Science has exclusive global distribution rights for these products, excluding the United Kingdom, Australia and Japan. Sigma and the Public Health England will continue to jointly distribute ECACC cell lines in the UK.

"This agreement strengthens our long standing relationship with ECACC and provides the scientific community with broader access to essential life science research tools," said Josef Zihlmann, VP Product Management and R&D, Research Markets. "Using authenticated ECACC cell lines eliminates potential research variables, which ultimately could lead to a reduction in time and expense for researchers. In addition, our web-based marketplace offers convenient access to a comprehensive range of products for the entire workflow, from cell lines to sera, to reagents and labware such as the premium quality SIGMA cultureware line."

Cautionary Statement: The foregoing release contains forward-looking statements that can be identified by terminology such as "will enable" or "ultimately could", similar expressions, or by expressed or implied discussions regarding potential future revenues from products derived there from. You should not place undue reliance on these statements. Such forward-looking statements reflect the current views of management regarding future events, and involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such statements. There can be no guarantee that ECACC cell lines will achieve any particular levels of revenue in the future. In particular, management's expectations regarding ECACC cell lines could be affected by, among other things, unexpected regulatory actions or delays or government regulation generally; the Company's ability to obtain or maintain patent or other proprietary intellectual property protection; competition in general; government, industry and general public pricing pressures; the impact that the foregoing factors could have on the values attributed to the Company's assets and liabilities as recorded in its consolidated balance sheet, and other risks and factors referred to in Sigma-Aldrich's current Form 10-K on file with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. Should one or more of these risks or uncertainties materialize, or should underlying assumptions prove incorrect, actual results may vary materially from those anticipated, believed, estimated or expected. Sigma-Aldrich is providing the information in this press release as of this date and does not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statements contained in this press release as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

About Sigma Life Science: Sigma Life Science is a Sigma-Aldrich business that represents the Company's leadership in innovative biological products and services for the global life science market and offers an array of biologically-rich products and reagents that researchers use in scientific investigation. Product areas include biomolecules, genomics and functional genomics, cells and cell-based assays, transgenics, protein assays, stem cell research, epigenetics and custom services/oligonucleotides. Sigma Life Science also provides an extensive range critical bioessentials like biochemicals, antibiotics, buffers, carbohydrates, enzymes, forensic tools, hematology and histology, nucleotides, amino acids and their derivatives, and cell culture media.

About Sigma-Aldrich: Sigma-Aldrich Corporation is a leading Life Science and High Technology company whose biochemical, organic chemical products, kits and services are used in scientific research, including genomic and proteomic research, biotechnology, pharmaceutical development, the diagnosis of disease and as key components in pharmaceutical, diagnostics and high technology manufacturing. Sigma-Aldrich customers include more than 1.3 million scientists and technologists in life science companies, university and government institutions, hospitals and industry. The Company operates in 38 countries and has nearly 9,000 employees whose objective is to provide excellent service worldwide. Sigma-Aldrich is committed to accelerating customer success through innovation and leadership in Life Science and High Technology. For more information about Sigma-Aldrich, please visit its website at www.sigma-aldrich.com.

Sigma-Aldrich and Sigma Life Science are trademarks of Sigma-Aldrich Co, LLC registered in the US and other countries. ECACC is a registered trademark of the Health Protection Agency in the UK.